Residential and commercial lawn tractors, garden tractors, front mower deck ride-on mowing machines, mid-mower deck ride-on mowing machines and zero turning radius (Z.T.R.) ride-on mowing machines (referred to below generally as ride-on turf mowing machines) are commonly shipped, stored, and operated in environments which varyingly give rise to desirability and a lack of desirability of mounting of an operator protecting roll bar. Where an operator of a ride-on-mower is secured upon the machine by a seat belt, and where the machine topples or rolls laterally, a roll bar installed thereon must extend upwardly overhead to an elevation sufficient to prevent an impact of the operator's head against the ground. Such ground contact may catastrophically fracture the operator's skull or neck. Accordingly, such roll bars typically extend approximately four feet above the operator's seat. Such upward roll bar extensions undesirably block compact stacked storage and shipping of ride-on turf mowing machines, giving rise to desirability of temporary removal of such roll bars during storage or shipping. Where a ride-on mower is operated exclusively upon substantially level ground surfaces, cost economies may be obtained by foregoing provision and mounting of such a roll bar, or by removing and interchanging such roll bar for use upon an alternate ride-on mower which is operated upon sloped ground surfaces.
Commonly, operator protecting roll bars are fixedly welded to frame members or chassis members of ride-on mowers. Directly welded attachments of roll bars advantageously provide structural rigidity and security against roll bar failure in the event of a rollover event. However, such welded attachments undesirably interfere with and prevent removal and interchangeability of roll bars for purposes of compact shipment and storage, or for achieving cost economies as described above.
The instant invention solves or ameliorates problems set forth above by providing a roll bar chassis mount assembly which efficiently, mechanically simply, and with cost economy alternately rigidly attaches a roll bar upon a ride-on turf mowing machine and permits detachment for roll bar removal.